Thatcher's legacy shows lack of humanity: PennLive letters

While many of the uninformed adorn the former Iron Lady with expressions of sorrow and loss, as an Irish Catholic, I prefer to remember Margaret Thatcher based upon her historic body of work.

While she was Prime Minister in 1981, Margaret Thatcher was complicit in the deaths of 10 Irish hunger strikers. Their only request was to be able to associate with other political prisoners, avoid wearing prison uniforms and not performing prison labor.

In 1982, Thatcher was ultimately responsible for the murder of 323 Argentinian sailors aboard the ship the General Belgrano, during the Falklands War. This was an undefended troop ship, beyond the 200 mile exclusion zone, heading back west towards the Argentine mainland.

During her reign as Prime Minister in 1984 the British coal mining industry was decimated by her anti-union policies. Over 20,000 miners lost their jobs and many communities in the north of England have never recovered.

Margaret Thatcher was a close ally and confidante of General Pinochet, the genocidal fascist dictator of Chile. The BBC reports Pinochet reportedly made a habit of sending chocolates and flowers to her during his twice-yearly visits to London and took tea with her whenever possible.

The Conservative Party prime minister dismissed Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress "a typical terrorist organization" and refused to back sanctions against the apartheid government, pursuing instead a policy of "constructive engagement”.

Maybe former "Smiths" frontman Morrissey tweeted it best: “She was barbaric without an atom of humanity.”